Re: [NTLK] Happy Holidays*

~~~ On 2008/01/06 05:45, Adam Goddard at pashosh@tpg.com.au wrote ~~~

> Uhg, too politically correct... I can't stand it when people say
> Happy Holidays. Why can't people just say Merry Christmas and be done
> with it? I celebrate the Christian holidays, and my Muslim girlfriend
> celebrates them with me, and I celebrate Ramadan and Eid with her.
> When Eid comes up, I say Eid Mubarak, not "Happy Holidays". Political
> correctness is a bane on society. [/rant] :-P

Hi Adam -- I agree in principle, but sometimes it can be difficult to know
who's celebrating what, especially now that we seem to have yielded to the
commercial pressure to stretch Christmas to run from halloween till new
year. This means, for example, that other holidays like Chanukkah falls
well within this "Christmas" (or perhaps I should write "Xma$" to
distinguish the commercial frenzy from the real deal). Result: the
possibility or even likelihood of wishing someone a happy something-or-other
that they don't even want to celebrate, while failing to wish them a happy
something-or-other that they do celebrate and perhaps even that is their
personal favourite of all holidays.

I naturally prefer to know folks well enough to greet them with the correct
holiday, but life isn't like that, and with each year I find the number of
acquaintances with whom I exchange greetings has grown, without me always
having come to know them well enough to know what they observe. "Happy
holidays" (ugh! *spit*) has to suffice for these folks.

And while we're on the subject, I'm in the midst of celebrating Ukrainian
Christmas (a non-commercial, but food-centred holiday), so to any other
Ukrainians out there, "Khrystos Razhdayetsya!"

 
Shalom.
Christian

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Received on Sun Jan 6 07:56:25 2008